A/N: Thank you all so much for your passionate reviews - they make me so happy! You guys are incredible and I thank you so much for your enthusiasm for this story


TWELVE

Kate awoke with a sharp intake of breath when the door to her makeshift prison cell creaked open. She blinked rapidly in the sudden light as her eyes began to water. The boiler room in which she was held was almost entirely dark save the small bit of light filtering in from the hallway beneath the door. Thus, she had no way to tell how long she was in the room and, with her blurred vision, no way to tell who was visiting her.

"Get up." A gruff voice commanded. Still attempting to clear her vision, Kate did not move, so she was roughly grabbed under the left elbow and hoisted to a standing position. By force, she stumbled forward and back out into the hall.

Within a few steps her vision adjusted once more and Kate could see that she was being led down a cinderblock wall hallway with concrete floors lit only by a lightbulb dangling from the ceiling every few feet. Had she not known better, she might have guessed she was in some sort of basement bunker, except they had not traveled down stairs at any point during her captivity.

Using the advantage of sight, Kate searched each wall and each corner they went around for an exit, but saw nothing but solid brick walls; that was unfortunate. As they walked, she also observed her captor. From what she could remember, this man had not been one of the ones who took her hostage when she was with Rick. He had auburn hair and a sizable mustache that she did not recall seeing before. He was also about twice her size and judging how painfully tight his grip on her arm was she was not going to be able to make an escape even if she did see a way out.

When the man led her around the next corner, Kate spotted the first sign of hope: a door! She felt her muscles coil and tighten, ready to flee at the first available opportunity, but one never came. The man led her directly to the door, opened it, and Kate realized it only led to a stairwell. As they began their ascent, she also came to the conclusion that she had been initially right: she was in a basement. Her best guess was that the building in which she was held was on a hill, thus making the basement accessible from a ground level without stairs, but also meaning there were floors above it.

One floor up, the red-haired man opened the stairwell door again and led her back out into a hallway. There, for the first time since leaving Rick, she was able to get her first glimpse of outside; to her left was what appeared to be a building lobby with a rounded desk and double glass doors. Judging by the pinkish-purple hues beginning to creep into the sky, Kate realized the day was coming to a close, which meant two things: she had been captive for approximately twelve hours and her window for escape had now diminished due to a lack of daylight. Still, if an opportunity presented itself, she knew she had to go for it.

Again, the red-haired man weaved her back many assorted hallways. From this level, the building appeared more office-like with an industrial carpet floor, drywall, and aesthetically pleasing light fixtures. Various doors also branched off from the hall at random, but she assumed these all led to interior rooms and offices and would not aid in her escape.

Kate's captor stopped in front of a large oak door where another, smaller man with a machete in his belt and a revolver in a shoulder holster stood guard. The two men nodded to one another, and the smaller man opened the oak door. She was then led into a room she quickly deduced as an executive's office. Or, at least it probably was when the building they were in was used as an office and not a bunker. It had wood-panel walls with built-in shelving. Along one wall sat a black leather couch along with two matching guest chairs. Straight ahead was a bulky black desk behind which stood the man Kate presumed to be "El Capitan."

At first blush, Kate was not overly impressed by the man. He was tall and lean; certainly not as bulky as even half his henchmen. He had a heavy brow and a sharp, angled nose making him appear not terribly different than a cartoon villain she might have seen on Saturday morning animated shows during her youth. He had dark hair that was cut in a regular men's style and a goatee that appeared well trimmed. Judging by his appearance alone, Kate presumed the man ruled on fear rather than by force.

When Kate met eyes with the man behind the desk, he gave her an almost smile. He walked around the desk until he was barely a few feet from Kate and asked her simply, "What's your name?"

"What's yours?" Kate countered.

The man tilted his head to the side and smirked, clearly amused. "Not interested in pleasantries, are you?"

As it happened, she was not. She was tired, hot, and more than a little sick of having her hands bound in front of her. Seeing as it had been going on twenty-four hours since she'd had anything to drink, she asked as politely as she could, "May I please have some water?"

The man ran his fingers over his goatee and repeated his first question. "What's your name?"

"Kate. May I please have some water?"

The man leaned back against the desk just as casually as ever. "If I give you water, what are you going to give me?"

Her brain somewhat foggy due to everything she'd been through that day, his statement did not entirely make sense to her so she replied with a dumb, "What?"

"I can't just give you water, Kate," the man said, making it sound as though she'd requested a million dollars' worth of diamonds and her own small country to rule. "We need to make a trade. If I give you water, what are you prepared to offer me in return?"

Kate glanced down at her bound hands and then back up at her captor. "Sorry," she said, "I left my wallet at home."

The man smirked. "Funny. You're a funny girl, Kate; I like that. As it happens, you're in luck because money doesn't seem to mean much anymore. There are, however, several other forms of payment we would more than happily accept."

Kate fought the urge to retch at his tone. He didn't have to make it any clearer; she certainly picked up on his implication, but she refused to give him the satisfaction of riling her up or trying to get a response out of her so she merely gazed at him with a bored expression. Their stand-off continued for the better part of two minutes before the man pushed himself off the desk and shrugged.

"Well, I guess you must not be that thirsty yet, huh Kate? Why don't we see how you feel in the morning? Maybe twelve more hours will change your mind."

Kate fought the urge to growl as the red-haired man grabbed her bicep once more and began to lead her out of the office. Twelve more hours certainly would make her thirst unbearable; however she'd sooner die than participate in depraved acts on the goateed man or any of his cohorts. Such a fate would be far worse than death.

Though it wasn't much, being a cop did come with a small amount of survival training, so Kate was quite familiar with the rule of threes. On average, a human could survive no more than three minutes without oxygen, three days without water, and three weeks without food. Come morning, she would be halfway to that three day mark. However, given the heat, she could only guess she might not make it quite to the seventy-two hour mark without being in dire straits.

As dying of dehydration was not something she preferred to experience, Kate became even more vigilant about potential avenues of escape on the way back to her cell. From what she could tell, they were traveling the exact path they came from, which meant she needed to keep her eyes focused on the set of glass doors. When they rounded the final corner, Kate's heart seized in her chest at her luck; two men carrying cases of bottled water were going through the doors, which meant they were propped open. Fearing this would be her one and only chance, she knew she had to try.

As swiftly as she could, Kate picked up her right foot and slammed it into the side of her captor's left knee, causing him to yell out and crumble. With the grip of her bicep now almost gone, Kate swiftly brought her hands down against her body, allowing her forearms to contact sharply with her hip bones, and the zip ties she had weakened several hours earlier on the sharp edge of the boiler split open giving her full use of her hands.

Breaking into a dead sprint, Kate made for the door. She was so quick the men carrying in the water hardly reacted by the time she barreled past them and out of the building. There, she ran into her next problem. As she had arrived blindfolded, she had not seen the exterior of the building in which she was held or the area surrounding, so she had to make decisions on the fly.

Immediately outside the door was a concrete sidewalk and blacktop paved parking-lot. Kate took off running towards the driveway leading into the parking lot figuring it had to lead to a street somewhere. Unfortunately, the drive was curved and due to trees and bushes she could not see much further. She was concerned about not knowing what lay around the corner, but also knew she had very little choice.

By the time she reached the curve in the drive Kate could hear shouting and pounding footsteps behind her meaning she was being followed. That was okay, she decided, because thanks to the prior eight years of chasing down perps, she believed she could out sprint them; however, when she rounded the corner, Kate's run almost came to a dead halt.

Kate had absolutely no idea what type of building she had been held in, but it certainly was not an ordinary office building, because the drive was blocked by a secured gatehouse. Worse yet, from that vantage point she could see that the entire area was surrounded by fencing and that fencing appeared to have barbed wire on the top.

Cursing to herself, Kate continued running knowing she had to do her best to find an escape point. The gatehouse was guarded, but the guard was on the other side of the fence, so she knew she could run past him without him being able to catch her. She continued to follow the fence line, hoping to find a point of egress, but found none. Glancing back over her shoulder, she noticed the men getting closer and knew she had no choice.

With one jump, Kate managed to get halfway up the ten foot high fencing. Though it was difficult to get enough of a space for her toes in the tight fencing, she managed to hoisted herself up to the top, where the barbed wire loomed in front of her. The only advantage she had was that the wire was meant to keep people on the outside from getting in, not to keep people on the inside from getting out, so it was angled down and away. She feared jumping out around and over it, concerned a hard landing would break her ankle or leg and thus leaving her in even worse shape, so she gutted her way through swinging her leg over the wire and doing her best to grab onto the fencing below. The barbs dug into her knees, shins, and forearms, but she did not cry out; she merely grunted and pushed herself off the fence at the first opportunity and continued running without looking back.


"Feeling better now, Rick?"

As Rick walked into the kitchen of the clubhouse, he gave a half smile and a nod, though was internally conflicted. After receiving both food and water, fresh clothing, and—miracle of miracles—a lukewarm shower, he was indeed feeling better physically. Emotionally, however, was a different story.

Kate was out there, somewhere. He didn't know where; he didn't know in what state. Had her captors fed her? Had they at least given her water? Had they harmed her in anyway? There he was, safe and secure, and her life could have been in danger at that very moment. The guilt of that situation weighed heavily on Rick and he imagined it would continue to do so until they were reunited.

When Henry and Pete had picked him up from the side of the road, Rick was still hesitant to trust them, despite their pleasant demeanor. They drove for about twenty minutes until reaching their final destination: a gated community that contained both residential housing and a country club. As Henry explained when they drove through, the gated entryway was a bit misleading. The fencing surrounding the community was not complete and thus did not leave them one hundred percent secured from wandering zombies, but it certainly was a decent-enough deterrent.

Since he had arrived quite weary, the men had first provided him with a bottle of water and a granola bar. Once he was no longer delirious with hunger or thirst, they sat him down in the country club's main clubhouse, and gave him a brief overview of their community of approximately seventy people.

Henry's wife was the tennis manager at the country club before the world fell into disarray. When things began to fall apart, she and several other employees decided to hole up there, mainly since the clubhouse had generators and they feared the area would eventually lose electricity, which, of course, it had. Pete and his wife were their neighbors so they joined along with half a dozen other employees families; the rest had chosen to flee. Their remaining population was made up of the community residents who had stayed behind; they had encountered very few outsiders.

Rick was both fascinated by and grateful for their assistance and information. He would have easily been satisfied by the food and water, but Henry and Pete had expanded their deal by providing him with pants that incredibly fit almost as well as if he'd bought them for himself, a clean shirt, and a shower with water warmed by the sun. In the end, he truly felt like a different man and was more than ready to set off looking for his girlfriend once more. The only obstacle left was the setting sun.

"I really appreciate everything you've done for me. Honestly, I cannot thank you enough, and if I could trespass on your hospitality and spend the night, I would be grateful, but I'm afraid I'll need to leave in the morning."

Pete and Henry exchanged glances. "That's what we wanted to talk to you about, actually."

Rick's heart clutched in his chest. Damn it! He knew it had been too easy! They were going to hold him hostage too! Or, worse, eat him or something equally gruesome. Taking two steps back, Rick held his hands out defensively. "Look, it's fine; I can go right now…"

Henry's brow wrinkled. "What? No. Why would you leave? It's almost dark out."

"I don't want any trouble…"

Pete's expression wrinkled into one of confusion. "Why would there be trouble?

"I…I'm not sure. You said you wanted to talk about something…" he said, still not allowing himself to relax.

"Yeah, we wanted to take you to see some of the other guys who have done more exploring than us to see if we can narrow down who took your girlfriend," Henry said in a tone that made it sound as though his benign intentions had been clear from the start.

Rick rounded his shoulders and let out a relieved breath. Okay, they weren't trying to kill him; they were trying to help him! Once again, his overactive imagination had feared the worst.

Henry and Pete led Rick from the clubhouse across the street towards the nearest house. As they walked and dusk fell, a few streetlamps flickered on overhead. When Rick commented on them, Pete explained that they were all fueled by solar cells, so on sunny days like that one they would remain on for several hours; some even until the morning. Though it was silly, it made Rick smile to see that something seemingly normal remained.

Inside the house now lit by candles and battery operated lamps, Rick was introduced to the wives of the men who had rescued him and three new people: husband and wife Mary and Luke, and former country club golf pro, Blake. From the way they were described, Mary and Luke, the original owners of the home in which he stood, seemed to know a great deal about the area and what was going on post-apocalypse. They asked Rick to describe the situation in which Kate was kidnapped and he did so with as much detail as he could recall despite his brain still being foggy.

When Rick's description was finished Mary looked at her husband and questioned, "El Capitan?"

"Sounds like it." he replied.

"Wait—who is El Capitan?" Rick asked immediately.

Luke sighed and clasped his hands together. "We don't know much and even that's too much about these guys. They've got themselves holed up in some really secure building. No idea what it used to be—there's no signage or anything, which leads me to guess government. Anyway, the building is surrounded by fences, barbed wire."

"So you know where it is?" Rick asked, his excitement growing. If he knew where their hideout was, that was more than half the battle as far as he was concerned.

Luke hesitated. "I was only near it one. I might be able to find my way back, but that's not the point. These guys are bad news. Back in the beginning—four or five months ago now—they tried to rough us up, take our supplies, but backed off when they realized just how many of us there were and how few of them."

"How many are there?"

"'bout thirty?" Luke guessed, glancing to his wife for confirmation.

"That we saw," Mary added.

"Right. And at the time we had over a hundred. Anyway, ever since that they've stayed out of our way and we've stayed out of theirs. It's just not worth it. We're not that heavily armed—had a horde come through a few months back, lost a bunch of people, used a lot of ammo," he explained briefly. "I mean, Blake can swing a mean golf club, but last we saw of El Capitan's men, they had some heavy weaponry."

"They definitely had a lot of guns," Rick said.

Luke bobbed his head. "Right. My point is that I'm really, really sorry about your girlfriend. Truly; I wouldn't with that on anyone, but please understand I have the safety of over seventy people to think about. I cannot risk starting something with them."

The hopeful feeling in his chest beginning to fade, Rick dropped his chin. "I get that, I really do. The last thing I want to do is put anyone, let alone a group as kind of yours, at risk, but I love this woman and I have to try and find her, no matter what."

When he was met with a room full of blank faces, he continued his plea. "I know that we just met and you have no reason to trust me let alone give me more than the water and food you already have. If this were a year ago I could offer you money, cars, sports tickets, vacations…anything, but none of that means anything now. All I am is a man with nothing left begging you to think about what you would do if it was your wife, girlfriend, child or someone else you loved that had been taken by this El Capitan guy. Would you just sit here and do nothing?"

Rick looked at each of them in turn, pleading silently for any aid they could give. He cursed the new reality for taking away all his usual avenues to bargain with. He would have happily given these people all the money it took to get their help, but all the money in his bank account didn't mean a damn thing anymore—not that he had any way of accessing it. All he could do was that these were good, honorable people and they would do what they could to help him even if it was by giving him nothing more than a bottle of water and an address.

Almost two minutes of silence went by before Pete chimed in with, "I wouldn't do nothing."

"No, neither would I but…we have to think about this. Not like we can do anything tonight anyway." Luke pointed out due to the fact that it was nearly completely dark outside. "Why don't you go back to the clubhouse, sleep on one of those spare cots, and we'll talk about this again in the morning?"

As it was as close as he could get to a yes, Rick nodded with relief. "Sure, of course. Thank you—for everything."

Luke reached out his hand to shake Rick's. "No problem. The world isn't totally lost if we can still help each other, right?"

Rick was all too happy to agree. "Exactly."


A/N: Quick status update to let you know where we're at. There are 2 more chapters of this story AND i'm going to post the "alternate ending" that I've written because i can. Upcoming I also have a fic based on a prompt from Lou (Inkycoffee) - that's just a mini fic though. And the next big one will be Murphy's Law but I actually just kind of started writing it so I dont think I'll start posting it until mid September probably. We'll see.

Thanks :)